CNN Turns 30, Quietly and Without Fanfare

By Marc Schneider Posted Jun 1st 2010 01:16PM

Does anyone enjoy turning 30? For many people, the milestone brings a sense of dread and that sinking feeling that your best days may be behind you. Well, CNN turns 30 today, and it's hard to imagine they don't feel the same way.

Ted Turner's ambitious Cable News Network aired its first broadcast on June 1, 1980, with a report by co-anchors David Walker and Lois Hart. In 2000, the network threw a huge party to celebrate its 20th birthday, but this time the network is passing the day without much fanfare.

Why so low-key? With viewers craving pundits and blowhards telling them exactly what they want to hear, the straight news-minded CNN has stuck to its guns -- you know, the news -- and lost.

Nonpartisan news reporting has gone the way of the Dodo. Ratings have plunged to new lows this year, with CNN's main hosts, Larry King and Anderson Cooper, shedding nearly half their audiences, according the New York Times.

The exodus of viewers has even cost the network one of its rising stars, Campbell Brown, who announced May 18 that "not enough people want to watch my program, and I owe it to myself and to CNN to get out of the way so that they can try something else."

The 24-hour news channel was a first on television, and for 16 years -- until the emergence of FOX News and MSNBC in 1996 -- it had a monopoly on the genre. In its heyday, viewers were glued to CNN for stories like the first Gulf War, major elections, the explosion of the Space Shuttle Challenger and, of course, the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.

The network's ratings are bound to improve, but even if they don't, the network's founder promised its survival.

Speaking just before the network's launch, Turner promised, "We won't be signing off until the world ends. We'll be on, and we will cover the end of the world, live, and that will be our last event ... and when the end of the world comes, we'll play 'Nearer My God to Thee' before we sign off."

Inside the company, CNN president Jim Walton announced today that employees will be giving back with a program called Give 30 for 30. Every eligible staffer will be able to give a company-paid donation of $30 to a charity of his or her choice.

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Comments

(129)

Tuesday 01 June

By JA Smith

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All news in this country is nothing but ideological propaganda... CNN included. The reason that FoxNews and MSNBC beat them in the ratings is because they are unabashed propagandists. Those at Fox are right-wing fear mongers, and those at MSNBC are left-wing guilt mongers... and the vast majority of news junkies are brainwashed ideologues that either gravitate toward one side or the other. CNN attempts to straddle the middle, though not very well, since they trend toward guilt mongering more often than fear mongering, so their viewership has dropped off because they aren't catering to the ideologues who watch 24 hour news channels. The vast majority of America tends to agree with the center, if not center-right, which isn't to say that the center-left doesn't have a sizable following as well, but they aren't glued to 24 hour news channels. Even the best-rated shows on Fox, like Glenn Beck and O'Reilly, only get a couple million viewers a night, in a country of over 300 million, so they're not doing too well in the scheme of things either. And regardless, virtually everyone in the country has been brainwashed by corporatist propaganda, as if corporatism is capitalism, so go figure.

By rbaker

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Well said, but some are too blind to see and only want to believe what they agree with. Pray for our country.

By sandra

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To be honest the reason why CNN is going down is because of the blatant biased coverage of the elections. MSNBC will go down first. They were the worst. I was an avid watcher of obermann have not seen him since the campaign for Obama and the mistreatmentof Hilary Clinton. CNN was not as bad but Cambell Brown and others were very brutal and biased so down they go.

By Kim

I like CNN and every news organization is going to have it's followers. So if one news program doesn't give you what you want then change the channel.

By Dave

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I watch CNN every day and enjoy it, especially Rick's List with Rick Sanchez. CNN reports the news without bias, unlike MSNBC which tells liberals what they want to hear and FOX which tells conservatives what they want to hear. MSNBC and FOX are nothing more than propaganda machines. CNN is a news organization - and a great one.

I liked seeing Rick Sanchez get tasered but that was about it. The guy is like a cartoon news guy; straight out of that movie Anchor Man...

By Char

People with longer memories remember that just before the first Gulf War CNN was caught lying about an Iraqi situation. CNN Blatantly stated that they had to tell the lie or Hussein would have kicked themout of Iraq. Go Figure- they wanted to stay and give false reports or they would be asked to leave the country. Who wants their false reporting???? Arent they owned by Ted Turner anyway?

By Justin

You're kidding yourself if you think any of these networks don't have an agenda. Do you people really think networks owned by Rupert Murdoch and Ted Turner don't lean right and left, respectively? CNN does a better job trying not to sensationalize the news, but the coverage still leans WAY left. Fox is basically a cartoon network. It's like TMZ meets news.

None of these networks are middle of the road, you're better off trying to get news from a foreign news agency than anything the american news networks offer. At least they don't have quite the vested interest in policy that the american networks do.

Why Americans can't think for themselves and need to be told how to think either way is a whole different topic. It's sad how stupid the general population really is, both on the left and the right.

Wednesday 02 June

By Kurt

Lou Dobbs was my last reason to tune CNN in. He was censored at first then later fired, I have not been back to CNN since!

By Truthteller 3

CNN is the only middle out there. But I will give props to Fox for the biggest font known to mankind. Its like Garamond Bold 90pt or something. I think I still have some of it etched in my LCD television.
When a dumbed down show like CSI Miami is no 1, and Fox News is the #1 news channel, then something is wrong. AOL is definitely the website of conservatives who haven't heard of factcheck.org or any other credible website blowing holes in Fox or MSNBC's leaning agendas.

By Ron

Nonpartisan news reporting has gone the way of the Dodo?? As IF CNN was anything close to non-partisan. CNN is tanking along with it's agenda, namely, liberalism. CNN, MSNBC, NY Times, Nancy Pelosi, Obama and Harry Reed and liberalism in general are circling the drain.

By Maria

"has stuck to its guns -- you know, the news -- and lost."

lol that's really funny.

If CNN just reported the facts this would be true. You want facts watch Bill O'Reilly..truly the most fair and balanced man in the news world plus a champion of children and our troops.

By ilikeguns

CNN's ratings speak for themselves.
They have a nasty habit of telling the viewer how/what to think.
Their reporting now, is more biased than CBS was during the Dan Rather days.

By Sick Of It ALL

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God, has the brain power hit absolute bottom on this thread. Fox News is NOT "fair and balanced," and until they engage in serious reform of their network, they NEVER WILL BE. Being old enough to remember when the Fairness Doctrine was still in force, news has NOT been "fair and balanced" since Reagan repealed the Doctrine and allowed Pandora's Box to be opened and thus let the Neo-conservative propaganda machine to re-start after 38 years.

And on whose word is this a "center-right nation"? Hannity's? You people buy everything Fox News and AM Talk Radio spoon feed you. I'm waiting for the day the right wing media start trying to convince its sheep that if you fling yourselves from high cliffs, you'll really fly.

By Tom

Non-partisan reporting? Puh-Lease! They're losing because America is sick of the ultra-liberal bias CNN has put on every report they've done since inception. To blame it on the viewers is pretty infantile. CNN is a pretty fragmented organization and if they mewrge with what's left of the CBS news operation, they'll effectively be irrelevant.

By JR

CNN is just more jib - jabs from the Lib-Labs. Maybe MSNBC will buy them out so Matthews & Madcow can look better

By Pete

CNN.....FOX...They both suck in their own way. Just report the news and keep the slant.

By mrkoe

It is a tragic and telling prophecy of where we are headed as a Nation when we prefer hype and fabrication ( Fox News ) over fact. Fox news billing itself as "Fair and Balanced" is like Ahmadinejad billing himself as "Sane and Stable".

By slpspp

I'm a moderate and happen to like CNN. I don't think ANY of these networks are fair or balanced. CNN leans to the left, FOX is far, far right. Hey, that's why there's chocolate and vanilla folks. Happy Birthday, CNN. BTW, as mentioned I'm a moderate who votes issue by issue and I'd like to see any of the hatemongers on here clean up the mess the president was handed in less than 18 months. Now there's a good one!

By MrD

You know, maybe Fox is not ENTIRELY non partisan. But my god, CNN invented partisan reporting, backed by their ultra liberal creator Ted Turner. You can only sustain partisan thinking so long until people get tired of hearing what CNN WANTS them to hear instead of what is REALLY fact based news.

I couldn't even tell you what channel CNN is on my cable system..that's how relevent they are to me.

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